Love's Pilgrimage Part 61

"You only land in the ditch!" added Corydon. "And that's just the way I felt to-night--she'd take your argument every time, and dump it into a ditch. And she'd see it there, and not care."

"She doesn't care about facts at all, Corydon. And notice this also--she doesn't care about succeeding. That's the thing you must get straight--her religion is a religion of failure! It comes back to that criticism of Nietzsche's--it's a slave-morality. The world belongs to the devil; and the idea of taking it away from the devil seems to be presumptuous. Even if it could be done, the attempt would be 'unspiritual'; for the 'world' is something corrupt--something that ought not to be saved. So you see, she's perfectly willing for the Belgians to have the rubber."

"'Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's'!" quoted Corydon.

"Yes, and let Caesar spend them on Cleo de Merode. What she wants is to save the _souls_ of her savages--to baptize them, and to perish gloriously at the work, and then be transported to some future life that is worth while. So you see what the immortality-mongers do with our morality!"

"Ah!" cried Corydon, swiftly. "But that need not be so!"

"But it _is_ so!" he answered.

"No, no!" she protested. "You must not say that! That is giving up--and I felt such a different mood in you to-night! I wanted to tell you--we must do something about it, Thyrsis! It made me ashamed of my own life.

Here I am, failing miserably--and all that work crying out to be done! I don't think I ever had such a sense of your power before--the things you might do, if only you could get free, if only I didn't stand in your way! Oh, can't we cast the old mistakes behind us, and go out into the world and preach that message?"

"But, my dear," said Thyrsis, "that wouldn't appeal to you always. Your temperament--"

"Never mind my temperament!" she cried. "I am sick of it, ashamed of it; I want the world to hear that trumpet-call! I want you to break your way into the churches--to make them listen to you, and realize their blasphemy of life!"

She caught hold of him and clung to him; he could feel, like an electric shock, the thrill of her excitement. He marvelled at the effect his words had produced upon her--realizing all the more keenly, in contrast with Delia, what a power of _mind_ he had here to deal with. "Dearest,"

he said, "I must put these things into my books. You must stand by me and help me to put them into my books!"

Section 6. Delia Gordon went away to take up her work in the city; but for many months thereafter that missionary impulse stayed with them.

They would find themselves seized with the longing to throw aside everything else, and to go out and preach Socialism with the living voice. They were still immersed in its literature; they read Bellamy's "Looking Backward", and Blatchford's "Merrie England", and Kropotkin's "Appeal to the Young". They read another book about England that moved them even more--a volume of sketches called "The People of the Abyss", by a young writer who was then just forging to the front--Jack London.

He was the most vital among the younger writers of the time, and Thyrsis watched his career with eager interest. There was also not a little of wistful hunger in his att.i.tude--he had visions of being the next to be caught up and transported to those far-off heights of popularity and power.

Also, they were kept in a state of excitement by the Socialist papers and magazines that came to them. There was a great strike that summer, and they followed the progress of it, reading accounts of the distress of the people. Every now and then the pain of these things would prove more than Thyrsis could bear, and he would blaze out in some fiery protest, which, of course, the Socialist papers published gladly. So little by little Thyrsis was coming to be known in "the movement". Some of his friends among the editors and publishers made strenuous protests against this course, but little dreaming how deeply the new faith had impressed him.

In truth it was all that Thyrsis could do to hold himself in; it seemed to him that he no longer cared about anything save this fight of the working-cla.s.s for justice. He was frightened by the prospect, when he stopped to realize it; for he could not write anything but what he believed, and one could not live by writing about Socialism. He thought of his war-book, for instance. It was but two or three months since he had finished it, and it was his one hope for success and freedom; and yet already he had outgrown it utterly. He realized that if he had had to go back and do it over, he could not; he could never believe in any war again, never be interested in any war again. Wars were struggles among ruling-cla.s.ses, and whoever won them, the people always lost.

Thyrsis was now girding up his loins for a war upon war.

So there were times when it seemed that a literary career would no longer be possible to him; that he would have to cast his lot altogether with the people, and find his work as an agitator of the Revolution. One day a marvellous plan flashed over him, and he came to Corydon with it, and for nearly a week they threshed it over, tingling with excitement.

They would sell their home, and raise what money they could, and get themselves a travelling van and a team of horses and go out upon the road on a Socialist campaign!

It was a perfectly feasible thing, Thyrsis declared: they would carry a supply of literature, and would get a commission upon subscriptions to Socialist papers. He pictured them drawing up on the main street of some country town, and ringing a dinner-bell to gather the people, and beginning a Socialist meeting. He would make a speech, and Corydon would sell pamphlets and books; they had animated discussions as to whether she might not learn to make a speech also. At least, he argued, she might sing Socialist songs!

Thyrsis was forever evolving plans of this sort; plans for doing something concrete, for coming into contact with the world of every day. The pursuit of literature was something so cold and aloof, so comfortable and conventional; one never pressed the hand of a person in distress, one never saw the light of hope and inspiration kindling in another's eyes. So he would dream of running a publis.h.i.+ng-house or a magazine, of founding a library or staging a play, of starting a colony or a new religion. And then, after he had made himself drunk upon the imagining, he would take himself back to his real job. For that summer his only indiscretions were to buy several thousand copies of the "Appeal to Reason", and hire the old horse and buggy, and distribute them over some thirty square miles of country; also to help to organize a club for the study of Socialism at the university; and finally, when he was in the city, to make a fiery speech at a meeting of some "Christian Socialists." Because of this the newspaper reporters dug out the accounts of his earlier adventures, and "wrote him up" with malicious bantering. And this, alas--as the publisher pointed out--was a poor sort of preparation for the launching of the war-novel.

Needless to add, the two did not fail to wrestle with those individuals whom they met. Thyrsis got a collection of pamphlets, judiciously selected, and gave them to the butcher and the grocer, the store-clerks and the hack-drivers in the town. But a college-town was a poor place for Socialist propaganda, as he realized with sinking heart; its population was made up of masters and servants, and there was even more sn.o.bbery among the servants than among the masters. The main architectural features of the place were fraternity-houses and "eating-clubs", where the sons of the idle rich disported themselves; once or twice Thyrsis pa.s.sed through the town after midnight, and saw these young fellows reeling home, singing and screaming in various stages of intoxication. Then he would think of little children shut up in cotton-mills and coal-mines, of women dying in pottery-works and lead-factories; and on his way home he would compose a screed for the "Appeal to Reason".

Section 7. Another victim of their fervor was the Rev. Mr. Harding, who stopped in to see them several times upon his tramps. Thyrsis would never have dreamed of troubling Mr. Harding, but Corydon found "something in him", and would go at him hammer and tongs whenever he appeared. It must have been a novel experience for the clergyman; it seemed to fascinate him, for he came again and again, and soon quite a friends.h.i.+p sprang up between the two. She would tell Thyrsis about it at great length, and so, of course, he had to change his ideas about Mr.

Harding.

"Don't you see how fine and sensitive he is?" she would plead.

"No doubt, my dear," said Thyrsis. "But don't you think he's maybe just a bit timid?"

"Timid," she replied. "But then think of his training! And think what you are!"

"Yes, I suppose I'm pretty bad," he admitted.

This discussion took place after he and Mr. Harding had had an argument, in which Thyrsis had remarked casually that modern civilization was "crucifying Jesus all over again." And when Mr. Harding asked for enlightenment, Thyrsis answered, "My dear man, we crucify him according to the const.i.tution. We teach the profession of crucifying him. We invest our capital in the business of crucifying him. We build churches and crucify him in his own name!"

After which explosion Corydon said, "You let me attend to Mr. Harding. I understand him, and how he feels about things."

"All right, my dear," a.s.sented Thyrsis. "When I see him coming, I'll disappear."

But that would not do either, it appeared, for Mr. Harding was a conventional person, and it was necessary that he should feel he was calling on the head of the family.

"Then," said Thyrsis, "I'm supposed to sit by and serve as a chaperon?"

"You're to answer questions when I ask you to," replied Corydon.

Through Mr. Harding they made other acquaintances in Bellevue. There was a Mrs. Jennings, the wife of the young princ.i.p.al of the High School; they were simple and kindly people, who became fond of Corydon, and would beg her to visit them. The girl was craving for companions.h.i.+p, and she would plead with Thyrsis to accompany her, and subject himself to the agonies of "ping-pong" and croquet; and once or twice he submitted--and so one might have beheld them, at a lawn-party, hotly pressed by half a dozen disputants, in a debate concerning the nature of American inst.i.tutions, and the future of religion and the home!

Thyrsis seldom took human relations.h.i.+ps seriously enough to get excited in such arguments; but Corydon, with her intense and personal temperament, made an eager and uncomfortable propagandist. How could anyone fail to see what was so plain to her? And so she would bring books and pamphlets, and lend them about. There was a young man named Harry Stuart, a fine, handsome fellow, who taught drawing at the High School. In him, also, Cordon discovered possibilities; and she repudiated indignantly the idea that his soulful eyes and waving brown hair had anything to do with it. Harry Stuart was a guileless and enthusiastic member of the State militia; but in spite of this sinister fact, Corydon went at him. She soon had her victim burning the midnight oil over Kautsky and Hyndman; and behold, before the autumn had pa.s.sed, the ill-fated drawing-teacher had resigned from the State militia, and was doing cartoons for the "Appeal to Reason"!

Section 8. Corydon's excitement over these questions was all the greater because she was just then making the discovery of the relations.h.i.+p of Socialism to the problems of her own s.e.x. Some one sent her a copy of Charlotte Gilman's "Women and Economics"; she read it at a sitting, and brought it to Thyrsis, who thus came to understand the scientific basis of yet another article of his faith. He went on to other books--to Lester Ward's "Sociology", and to Bebel's "Woman", and to the works of Havelock Ellis. So he realized that women had not always been clinging vines and frail flowers and other uncomfortable things; and the hope that they might some day be interested in other matters than fas.h.i.+on and sentiment and the pursuit of the male, was not a vain fantasy and a Utopian dream, but was rooted in the vital facts of life.

Throughout nature, it appeared, the female was often the equal of the male; and even in human history there had been periods when woman had held her own with man--when the bearing of children had not been a cause of degradation. Such had been the case with our racial ancestors, the Germans; as one found them in Tacitus, their women were strong and free, speaking with the men in the council-halls, and even going into battle if the need was great. It was only when they came under the Roman influence, and met slavery and its consequent luxury, that the Teutonic woman had started upon the downward path. Christianity also had had a great deal to do with it; or rather the dogmas which a Roman fanatic had imposed upon the message of Jesus.

It was interesting to note how one might trace the enslavement of woman, step by step with the enslavement of labor; the two things went hand in hand, and stood or fell together. So long as life was primitive, woman filled an economic function, and held her own with her mate. But with slavery and exploitation, the heaping up of wealth and the advent of the leisure-cla.s.s _regime_, one saw the woman becoming definitely the appendage of the man, a household ornament and a piece of property; securing her survival, not by useful labor, but by s.e.xual charm, and so becoming specialized as a s.e.x-creature. For generations and ages the male had selected and bred in her those qualities which were most stimulating to his own desires, which increased in him the sense of his own dominance; and for generations and ages he taught the doctrine that the proper sphere of woman was the home. If he happened to be a German emperor, he summed it up in the sneer of "Kuche, Kinder, Kirche". So the woman became frail and impotent physically, and won her success by the only method that was open to her--by finding some male whom she could ensnare.

Such had been the conditions. But now, in the present century, had come machinery, and the development of woman's labor; and also had come intelligence, and woman's discovery of her chains. So there was the suffrage movement and the Socialist movement. After the overthrow of the compet.i.tive wage-system and of the leisure-cla.s.s tradition, woman would no longer sell her s.e.x-functions, whether in marriage or prost.i.tution; and so the s.e.x might cease to survive by its vices, and to infect the whole race with its intellectual and moral impotence. So would be set free the enormous force that was locked up in the soul of woman; and human life would be transformed by the impulse of emotions that were fundamental and primal. So Thyrsis perceived the two great causes in which the progress of humanity was bound up--the emanc.i.p.ation of labor and the emanc.i.p.ation of woman; to educate and agitate and organize for which became the one service that was worth while in life.

Section 9. The nights were beginning to grow chilly, and they realized that autumn was at hand, and faced the prospect of another winter in that lonely cabin. Paret, who had come down to visit them, had given it a name--"the soap-box in a marsh." Thyrsis saw clearly that he could not settle down to hard work while they were shut up there. Corydon's headaches and prostrations seemed to be growing worse, and she could simply not get through the winter without some help. As the book was ready, they had some money in prospect, and their idea was that they would buy a farm with a good house. So they might keep a horse and a cow and some chickens; and there might be some outdoor work for Thyrsis to do, instead of trudging aimlessly over the country.

They utilized their spare time by getting the old horse and buggy, and inspecting and discussing all the farms within five miles of them; an occupation which put a great strain upon their diverse temperaments.

Thyrsis would be thinking of such matters as roads and fruit-trees and barns--and above all of prices; while Corydon would be concerned with--alas, Corydon never dared to formulate her vision, even to herself. She had vague memories of dilettante country-places with great open fire-places, and exposed beams, and a broad staircase, and a deep piazza, and above all, a view of the sunset. Whenever she came upon any vague suggestion of these luxuries, her heart would leap up--and would then be crushed by some reference to ten or fifteen thousand dollars.

Corydon was a poor sort of person to take an inspection-trip. She would gaze about and say, "There might be a piazza here"; and then she would look across the fields and add, "There'd be a good view if it weren't for those woods"--and wave the woods away with the gesture of a d.u.c.h.ess.

So, of course, the observant farmer would add a thousand dollars to the asking-price of his property.

On the other hand, when Thyrsis with his remorseless thoroughness would insist on getting out and inspecting some dilapidated and forlorn-looking place--then what agonies would come! Corydon would pa.s.s through the rooms, suffering all the horrors which she might have suffered in years of occupancy of them. And there was no use pleading with her to be reserved in her att.i.tude--she took houses in the same way that she took people, either loving them or hating them. So, from an afternoon's driving-trip, she would come home in a state of exhaustion and despair; and Thyrsis would have to pledge himself upon oath not to think of this or that horrible place for a single instant again.

There were times when Thyrsis, too, in spite of his lack of intuition, felt the atmosphere of evil which hung about some of these old farms.

Having lived for a year and a half in the neighborhood, and been favored with the gossip of the washerwoman, and of the farmer's wife, and of the girl who came to clean house now and then, they had come to know the affairs of their neighbors--they had got a cross-section of an American small-farming community. It was in amusing accord with Thyrsis' social theories that the only two decent families in the neighborhood inhabited farms of over a hundred acres. There were several farms of fifty or sixty acres occupied by tenants, who were engaged, in plundering them as fast as they could; and then a host of little places, of from one to twenty acres, on which families were struggling pitifully to keep alive.

And with scarcely a single exception, these homes of poverty were also homes of degradation. Across the way from Thyrsis was an idiot man; upon the next place lived an old man who was a hopeless drunkard, and had one son insane, and another tubercular; and then down in the meadows below the woods lived the Hodges--a name of direful portent. The father would work as a laborer in town for a day or two, and buy vinegar and make himself half insane, and then come home and beat his wife and children.

There were eleven of these latter, and a new one came each year; the eldest were thieves, and the youngest might be seen in midwinter, playing half-naked before the house. The Hodges were known to all the neighbors for miles about, and the amount of energy which each farmer expended in fighting them would have maintained the whole family in comfort for their lives.

Thyrsis had travelled enough about the New England and Middle Atlantic states to know that these conditions were typical of the small-farming industry in all the remoter parts. The people with enterprise had moved West, and those who stayed behind divided and mortgaged their farms, and sunk lower and lower into misery and degradation. This was one more aspect of that n.o.ble system of _laissez faire_; this was the independent small-farmer, whose happiness was the theme of all orthodox economists!

He was, according to the newspaper editorials, the backbone of American civilization; and once every two years, in November, he might be counted upon to hitch up his buggy and drive to town, and pocket his two-dollar bill, and roll up a glorious majority for the Grand Old Party of Protection and Prosperity.

Section 10. The date of publication of the book had come at last. It was being generously advertised, under the imprint of a leading house; and Thyrsis' heart warmed to see the advertis.e.m.e.nts. This at last, he felt, was success; and then the reviews began to come in, and his heart warmed still more. Here was a new note in current fiction, said the critics; here were power and pa.s.sion, a broad sweep and a genuine poetic impulse.

American history had never been treated like this before, American ideals had never been voiced like this before. And these, Thyrsis noted, were the opinions of the representative reviews--not those of obscure provincial newspapers. Victory, it seemed, had come to him at last!

He came up to the metropolis on the strength of these triumphs; for he had observed that when one had a new book coming out was the psychological moment to attack the magazine-editors. One was a personality then, and could command attention. It was the height of a presidential campaign, and the Socialists were making an impression which was astonis.h.i.+ng every one. The idea had occurred to Thyrsis that some magazine might judge it worth while to tell its readers about this new and picturesque movement.

To his great delight the editor of "Macintyre's Monthly" looked with favor upon the suggestion, and asked to see an article at once. So Thyrsis shut himself up in a hotel-room and wrote it over night. It proved to be so full of "ginger" that the editorial staff of Macintyre's was delighted, and made suggestions as to another article; at which point Thyrsis made a desperate effort and summoned up his courage, and insinuated politely that his stuff was worth five cents a word. The editor-in-chief replied promptly that that seemed to him proper.